OREGON CITY, Ore. (CN) - A doctor who spent 30 years working with sex offenders says the state licensing board published a client's false accusations that he sexually abused her, despite its knowledge that she had run "at least 24 such extortion type schemes" involving bogus sex charges.
Dr. Richard King says Oregon's Board of Licensed Counselors and Therapists knew that his former client's mental illness "resulted in her being predatory and aggressive in her sexual pursuits and then claiming the role of victim to extract sums of money."
He claims that (nonparty) Stacy Rasmussen nee Derr sued him unsuccessfully in 2006, and "The case was dismissed. It was determined after Ms. Derr's deposition that at least 24 such extortion type schemes were propagated by Ms. Derr up to the 2006 lawsuit."
King says he had a 28-year career as "a pioneer in creating and setting treatment standards for sex offenders." He says he developed a nationally recognized program that became the "gold standard" used by "virtually all the criminal courts" in the Portland metropolitan area.
Now, King says his reputation is ruined, he has lost his ability to earn a living, he spent his life's savings on lawyers and his home is in foreclosure. He wants more than $5 million.
King says he treated Derr when she was "a minor and in state custody on several sexually related offenses," and was living in a treatment facility between 1995 and 1999.
In 1995, while attending court-ordered therapy for "harassment and inappropriate sexual contact with several men," Derr's therapists determined that "she would many times falsely allege sexual contact with men," King says.
King says "most of the staff" at his company, Child/Adult Intervention Services Inc., noticed her "inappropriate behaviors."
King says Derr had an "intense obsession with older men which she would seduce with intense sexually explicit phone calls and then allege sexual contact even where none occurred."
He says that because of her "aggressive and inappropriate behavior," she was barred from using the phone and had "seriously limited home visits." She was never allowed to be alone with any staff member or therapist, including himself, King says.
In 2001, King says Derr called him "out of the blue" and claimed to have had a sexual relationship with a former teacher. King says he reported her claim to police, who declined to file criminal charges because she was over 21.
Later, she sued the former teacher, who eventually was fired, King says.
In 2004, King says, Derr called him again, seeking marriage counseling for herself and her husband. King says she was "not qualified" to be a Child/Adult Intervention client because of her background at the clinic. He says another doctor and the clinic's office manager both turned the woman away. She responded by harassing clinic employees, calling the office several times a day and getting staff members' home numbers for further harassment, according to the complaint.
King says Child/Adult Intervention staff filed stalking and harassment complaints against her in Multnomah County Court.
That same year, King says, he found out that the woman had had sex "in a van while her infant daughter was present." King says he reported that to the Department of Human Services in Washington County.
Around that time, King says, Derr began calling his wife, claiming that she and King were having an affair. She claimed they had met for their "purported liaisons," when King was out of the country on vacation, King says.
After she sued him in 2006, King says, the court dismissed the case after finding that she had faked a supposed tape of a phone conversation with him.
Despite the dismissal, King says, Derr's lawyer demanded he pay $65,000 to settle the case.
He says the lawyer told him she would file a complaint with the state board if he refused.
King says he refused, and the lawyer filed the complaint in 2006.
King says Derr told the board that he had repeatedly had sex with her in Child/Adult Intervention's offices and had made sexually explicit phone calls to her when she was a client.
King says the board reported the woman's claims as though they were the truth on its Web site.
The board stayed the complaint, pending resolution of Derr's lawsuit against King, according to the current complaint.
When the lawsuit was dismissed, the board also dismissed the woman's administrative complaint, King says.
But he says that in 2008, the board's new director reopened the claim.
He says the board's new director and Oregon's assistant attorney general "aggressively pursued the revitalized compliant, despite the fact that the deadlines had passed and no legitimate proof of culpability exists."
King, then 72, says he was already preparing to retire, so agreed to a stipulated retirement, to get the whole ordeal over with. He says he did not admit any wrongdoing and just wanted the thing done.
Despite agreeing that the facts of the case were "unproven and strongly contested," the Board published the woman's allegations as true on its Web site, along with the claim that it had "publically disciplined" King, the lawsuit states.
The board also represented as the truth some claims that "were never the topic of the original investigation," King says.
In February 2009, the board's executive director repeated the allegations against King in a radio interview and said he "had been disciplined," according to the complaint.
King seeks $5 million for defamation and breach of contract. He is represented by Michelle Burrows in Clackamas County Court.
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